1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to apparatus for playing games and in particular to apparatus for playing a dart game.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In one prior art form of dart game, a plurality of darts are provided with sharp metal tips adapted to penetrate a dart board provided with a suitable marked field to provide scoring and the like. Such sharp tipped darts present a safety problem in that serious injury can result from accidental striking of a person by a thrown dart. Further, quite often the darts might miss the dart board and damage the adjacent wall surface. One solution to this problem has been to provide darts with rubber suction cups in lieu of the sharp tips and use therewith a relatively smooth surface dart board to permit the suction cup darts to adhere to it. It has been found that such suction cup darts do not provide a fully satisfactory answer to the problem because of failure to adhere, such as when striking the board at other than a perpendicular angle, and further, such suction cup devices have been found to tend to deteriorate over a period of time, preventing proper suction action on impact.
One other attempted solution to the problem has been to use a fabric dart board and a barbed nose portion on the darts cooperating with the dart board fabric to retain the thrown dart. Such prior art barbed darts have presented the problem of impositive retention upon striking the dart board.